Supercritical fluid chromatography of North American ginseng extract

Advanced Development of Supercritical Fluid Chromatography in Herbal Medicine Analysis

The greatest challenge in the analysis of herbal components lies in their variety and complexity. Therefore, efficient analytical tools for the separation and qualitative and quantitative analysis of multi-components are essential. In recent years, various emerging analytical techniques have offered significant support for complicated component analysis, with breakthroughs in selectivity, sensitivity, and rapid analysis. Among these techniques, supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC) has attracted much attention because of its high column efficiency and environmental protection. SFC can be used to analyze a wide range of compounds, including non-polar and polar compounds, making it a prominent analytical platform. The applicability of SFC for the separation and determination of natural products in herbal medicines is overviewed in this article. The range of applications was expanded through the selection and optimization of stationary phases and mobile phases. We also focus on the two-dimensional SFC analysis. This paper provides new insight into SFC method development for herbal medicine analysis.

Ultra-high performance supercritical fluid chromatography method for separation and quantitation of saikosaponins in herbal medicine

Saikosaponins are the main active ingredients of Bupleuri Radix and have been shown to have hepatoprotective, immunomodulatory and anti-viral activities. Among the saikosaponins, saikosaponin a (SSa), saikosaponin b₁ (SSb₁) and saikosaponin b₂ (SSb₂) are a group of isomers, which are difficult to separate by HPLC. In this study, a new method for separation and quantitation of saikosaponins was established by using ultra-high performance supercritical fluid chromatography (UHPSFC). A Torus Diol column (100 mm × 3 mm, 1.7 μm) was applied in this study. The mobile phase CO₂ (A) was the main solvent with MeOH (B) as co-solvent. The results showed that the five saikosaponins were successfully separated within 22 min through optimization of chromatographic conditions. Besides, the UHPSFC method was applied for the quantitation of saikosaponins in a patent medicine Chaihu Dropping Pills, and demonstrated a good correlation coefficient (R²) ≥ 0.9990 in the range of 0.025 - 0.25 mg/mL. The recoveries of the five saikosaponins at three different concentrations were in the range of 90.23-99.84%. This study indicates that the proposed method has high separation efficiency in analyzing saikosaponins, which provides a new way for the separation and quantitation of saikosaponins in herbal medicines.

Supercritical CO2 Extraction and Identification of Ginsenosides in Russian and North Korean Ginseng by HPLC with Tandem Mass Spectrometry

Ginseng roots, Panax ginseng C.A. Meyer, obtained from cultivated ginseng grown in the Kaesong province (North Korea) and Primorye (Russia) were extracted using the supercritical CO₂ extraction method. The extracts were subsequently analyzed by high-performance liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry identification. The results showed the spectral peaks of typical ginsenosides with some other minor groups, and major differences were observed between the spectra of the two ginseng samples. The use of a pressure of 400 bar and higher allowed an increase in the yield of ginsenosides in comparison with similar previous studies

Supercritical fluid chromatography-a technical overview and its applications in medicinal plant analysis: an update covering 2012-2018

Medicinal plants with complex matrices are endowed with a wide scope of biological activities. The separation, quantification, characterization and purification of bioactive components from herbal medicine extracts have always challenged analysts. Fortunately, the advancement of various emerging techniques has provided potent support for improving the method selectivity, sensitivity and run speeds in medicinal plant analyses. In recent years, the advent of new-generation supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC) instruments and a wide diversity of column chemistries, coupled with the intrinsic technical features of SFC, have made it an alternative and prominent analytical platform in the medicinal plant research area. This work aims to give a comprehensive overview of the fundamentals, technical advancement and investigating parameters of SFC in combination with three prevalent detectors. Moreover, the latest research progress of SFC applications in medicinal plant analyses is illuminated, with focus on herbal medicine-related SFC papers on the analytical and preparative scale that were published during the period of 2012 to December 2018. The most relevant applications were classified based on the constituents to be analysed. As for the respective research cases, analytical protocols and data processing strategies were provided, along with the indicated restrictions or superiority of the method; thus, the current status of SFC in medicinal plant analysis was presented.

Rapid Determination of Two Triterpenoid Acids in Chaenomelis Fructus Using Supercritical Fluid Extraction On-line Coupled with Supercritical Fluid Chromatography

In this study, an on-line supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) and supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC) method was developed for the rapid determination of oleanoic acid and ursolic acid in Chaenomelis Fructus. After optimization of the conditions, the two triterpenoid acids was obtained by SFE using 20% methanol as a modifier at 35°C in 8 min. They were resolved on a Shim-pack UC-X Diol column (4.6 × 150 mm, 3 μm) in 14 min (0 - 10 min, 5 - 10%; 10 - 14 min, 10% methanol in CO2) with a backpressure of 15 MPa at 40°C. The on-line SFE-SFC method could be completed within 40 min (10.79 mg/g dry plant, Rs = 2.36), while the ultrasound-assisted extraction and HPLC method required at least 90 min (3.55 mg/g dry plant, Rs = 1.92). This on-line SFE-SFC method is powerful to simplify the pre-processing and quantitative analysis of natural products.

Effect-directed analysis supporting monitoring of aquatic environments--An in-depth overview

Aquatic environments are often contaminated with complex mixtures of chemicals that may pose a risk to ecosystems and human health. This contamination cannot be addressed with target analysis alone but tools are required to reduce this complexity and identify those chemicals that might cause adverse effects. Effect-directed analysis (EDA) is designed to meet this challenge and faces increasing interest in water and sediment quality monitoring. Thus, the present paper summarizes current experience with the EDA approach and the tools required, and provides practical advice on their application. The paper highlights the need for proper problem formulation and gives general advice for study design. As the EDA approach is directed by toxicity, basic principles for the selection of bioassays are given as well as a comprehensive compilation of appropriate assays, including their strengths and weaknesses. A specific focus is given to strategies for sampling, extraction and bioassay dosing since they strongly impact prioritization of toxicants in EDA. Reduction of sample complexity mainly relies on fractionation procedures, which are discussed in this paper, including quality assurance and quality control. Automated combinations of fractionation, biotesting and chemical analysis using so-called hyphenated tools can enhance the throughput and might reduce the risk of artifacts in laboratory work. The key to determining the chemical structures causing effects is analytical toxicant identification. The latest approaches, tools, software and databases for target-, suspect and non-target screening as well as unknown identification are discussed together with analytical and toxicological confirmation approaches. A better understanding of optimal use and combination of EDA tools will help to design efficient and successful toxicant identification studies in the context of quality monitoring in multiply stressed environments.